


Saturnine

by Rotpeach



Series: The Great Tumblr Rehoming of 2018 [4]
Category: Boyfriend to Death (Visual Novels)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Experimentation, Stitches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-07
Updated: 2016-10-07
Packaged: 2019-09-24 05:47:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17095007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rotpeach/pseuds/Rotpeach
Summary: Sano makes a mistake. Akira helps him deal with the aftermath.





	Saturnine

**Author's Note:**

> originally written for goretober 2016; prompt "stitches"

Sano knows it’s his own fault.

There’s a slight tremor in his hands that makes him imprecise and unsteady, fingers clumsy as he lets the soap slip into the sink basin for the second time. He curses under his breath and reaches after it, and blood runs down the drain, oozing out of a throbbing gash on his right hand.  That was careless, he thinks and winces as he sticks the wound beneath the stream of lukewarm water and starts to disinfect it.  

He’d been distracted, his attention pulled a million different directions and his thoughts everywhere but in the room or on the task at hand.  The experiment hadn’t been properly restrained, and he’d completely missed the dangerous twinkle in their eye the moment before they rose from the examination table and had the audacity to bite him.  He supposes he’s fortunate; their limbs must’ve still been numb or surely they would’ve tried to do a little more damage.  Not that he couldn’t have regained control of the situation, but today he’s just….

Out of it?  Not in full possession of his mental faculties?  “Off his game,” as Akira would put it?  

 _Careless_ , he reminds himself, that’s all.  

He turns off the water and keeps his palm facing the ceiling, trying not to drip blood all over the floor as he opens the box of surgical sutures.  His hands are still shaking and it takes him far longer than he’d like to attach the thread to the small, hooked needle.  It was just a mistake, a momentary lapse in judgement, and yet he can’t understand it.  He doesn’t do things like that.  He doesn’t forget to check the restraints or allow his mind to wander because that would be careless and he is not careless.  

And yet, here he is, struggling to pull the frayed ends of the wound together and stitch it shut with one hand, blood slicking his fingers and making the task even more difficult.  The wound will take time to heal and every day that he has to look at it, he’ll be reminded that he was careless after all.

“Everything okay in there?”

Sano freezes.  The bathroom door opens and Akira pokes his head in, expression going from curious to horrified in a matter of seconds.  

“What the hell happened?” his brother asks—demands, really, and Sano is suddenly brought back to the past, half a dozen moments in childhood and adolescence with bruised knees or paper cuts and Akira right beside him with wide eyes and trembling hands, like he feels responsible somehow.  

“Nothing,” he mutters.  Only now does he notice a trail of blood that stretches across the tile floor and out into the hall beneath Akira’s feet, another thing he missed until it was too late.   _Careless_.

Akira grips his wrist and stares hard at the wound, and something like embarrassment runs through Sano.  He doesn’t want to be seen like this, bleeding because of a stupid mistake.  “Akira, please, I’m already halfway done.”

“What happened?” Akira asks again, even more harshly this time, and refuses to relinquish Sano’s wrist.

“Just an experiment,” Sano says reluctantly, “I wasn’t paying attention like I should’ve been, that’s all.  It’s really not a serious wound.”

Akira’s eyes widen and then narrow with rage.  “That human you brought home did this?  They, what, fucking attacked you?”  

It sounds even more ridiculous when spoken aloud.  Sano has trouble looking his brother in the eye.

“I’ll kill them,” Akira is saying, already halfway out the bathroom door.

“No, you won’t.  They’re already dead.”

Akira stops, glancing back over his shoulder.  Sano busies himself with finishing the suture on his palm and taking far longer than he really needs to. “They’re already dead?” his brother repeats.

“Yes.”

“You killed them?”

“Yes,” Sano looks up in annoyance and regrets it immediately.  Akira is looking at him with—with sympathy, probably, but he sees pity instead, pity for his poor, flawed brother who can’t seem to keep it together.

“You don’t usually….”  Akira shrugs.  “I mean, you do, but not this soon.  That’s not like you.”

Here, Sano could retort that he had every right to retaliate, but he doesn’t because what Akira says is the truth.  In the ordinary way of things, such an enthusiastic reaction from an experiment would merit further observation.  He’d administer a stronger paralyzing agent.  He’d test the limits of their endurance.  

He’d double-check the restraints first, of course.  How could he have forgotten? 

“What’s wrong?” his brother asks.

Sano shakes his head.  “I’m fine.”

Akira rolls his eyes.  “Alright.  So why’d you go to the trouble of stitching yourself up rather than just using some magic to heal yourself?”

“I….”  

The silence persists long after he trails off.  Akira waits, like he always does, as long as he needs to.

“It didn’t even occur to me,” Sano admits at last, to his brother and to himself. “I don’t know what the problem is.  I’ve just felt off; distracted, maybe.” _Careless_ , the word is on the tip of his tongue but he refuses to speak it aloud. “I forgot to check the restraints.  Just…forgot.  I’ve never done that before.  I just wasn’t paying attention, and the next thing I knew I was getting bitten on the hand.  Can you believe that?  It’s so…backwards….”  He can’t even laugh. “It’s frustrating.  I feel inefficient and…and….”

Useless.

He doesn’t say that word, either.

Akira doesn’t speak for a minute, and the only sound in the bathroom is the occasional drip of the faucet.  Then, he slings an arm over Sano’s shoulder and sighs.  “Sounds like someone needs a day off.”

“What?  No, I don’t need…did you listen to a word I said?”

“Yeah, I did.”  Akira drags him out of the bathroom and down the hall, opening his bedroom door and shoving him inside.  “Take it easy for once, alright?  I’m gonna run to the store real quick, want anything?”

Sano doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything.  His hand is still throbbing but the bleeding isn’t as bad now.  Akira acts as though this is something trivial that can be solved by a day of rest, and Sano’s knee-jerk reaction is to be resentful, but he meets Akira’s gaze and finds the same comforting expression he’s seen for years, a soft and barely-there smile that pleads with him to just trust his brother for once.

Akira starts to shut the door when Sano calls, “Tea.”

His brother stops, glancing at him.

“Could you…if it’s not too much trouble….”

Akira nods in understanding. “Sure thing.  I’ll be right back.”

When he leaves, Sano lays down and discovers that he’s actually exhausted. He holds up his hand and traces the sloppy stitch work with his eyes. Tomorrow will be better, he tells himself, and doesn’t fight it when he finally drifts off to sleep.


End file.
